A Selection Of Supernatural Seas

Lotus Sea

The surface of the sea here is covered in floating water lilies, a vast plane of glittering white flowers. As the Primrose sails through it, it leaves a trail of open water that slowly closes as the lotuses drift back.

Eating the lotuses is a mild euphoric. The high gives the eater +1 to every roll they make (damage, saves, etc). At the end of this, they can eat another lotus to keep the high going, or suffer the comedown. The comedown lasts as long as the high did, during which time they suffer -1 to every roll. For fresh lotuses straight from the water, the high lasts for an hour; otherwise, the high lasts a turn. A lotus loses power entirely a week after it’s taken from the water.

Within the lotus sea, there are a handful of black lotuses, which have far greater potency.  The high from a black lotus lasts for a full day (or an hour if it’s not fresh), and gives a +5 bonus (the comedown likewise inflicts a -5 penalty). If a second black lotus is eaten to prevent the comedown beginning, the eater must make a Save vs Paralysis. If they fail, they fall into a coma lasting as many days as the result on the d20 that failed the save, during which time they are plagued by nightmares and visions of hell. If the save is passed, however, the eater is forever changed. Consult table XX (slipping beyond the bounds of mortality) for how.

There is a 1-in-20 chance of finding a black lotus just by sailing through the lotus sea, or 1-in-10 if deliberately looking.

Maelstrom

This whole sea is caught in a huge circular current that spirals inwards, pulling ships inexorably to its centre. At the centre is a huge whirlpool, mountain sized, that swallows ships whole. Surrounding the maelstrom, like the accretion disk around a black hole, is the debris of countless wrecked ships smashed to bits by the maelstrom’s power.

When the maelstrom’s surrounding sea is first entered, whoever’s at the helm must make a Strength roll to avoid being pulled further in; if this is passed the ship can continue as normal, but if failed the primrose is drawn towards the Maelstrom.

If this happens, every hour, whoever is at the helm must make a Strength check to resist the maelstrom’s pull. If they wish to allow the ship to be drawn towards the maelstrom’s centre, they can roll as many extra d20s for the check as they wish, and take the worst result.

Explain the dice mechanisms being used to the players, and the potential risks and rewards, and let them make their own decision on how close to the maelstrom they wish to be pulled.

If the check is failed, note the actual result on the dice (taking the worst dice if multiple were rolled) and add it to a running total for how far into the maelstrom the Primrose has been drawn. If this running total reaches 40, the Primrose is pulled into the maw of the maelstrom and utterly destroyed.

If the dice roll is passed, note down the result on the dice and add it to a running total for how much progress the Primrose has made in escaping the maelstrom. If this total is higher than the running total for the maelstrom’s pull, the Primrose escapes the maelstrom and is able to continue sailing normally.

Regardless of if the roll was passed or failed, look up the result of the dice roll on page XX (treasure) for what can be dredged out of the water. If multiple dice were rolled, look up all of them.

The maelstrom exerts a much lower pull on small vessels (such as life-rafts, rowing boats, etc), which might be deduced from the way the flotsam isn’t being pulled into the maelstrom’s heart. If piloting a small vessel like this, roll the relevant Strength check on a d12. Start a new running total for the new vessel if they abandon ship and board an escape raft etc. In the worst case scenario, if the crew leap into the water and try to swim to safety, then roll using a d8.

Ink

The sea here is composed of ink, not water. Almost opaque, staining everything that touches it, slightly sticky. Even the air feels grubby.

Pitch black fish, adapted to the environment, lurk in the pitch black ocean.

Precambrian Nursery

When the world was young, there was an explosion of life, infinitely varied, wildly experimental. Strange creatures not seen since emerged, flourished, and died out.

This age did not last. Without the ambient force of  possibility and vigour to sustain its wildest excesses, life fell into a few, well-worn patterns, that survive to the present day.

In this area of sea, however, that never happened. The atmosphere of vibrant potential hangs over the sea, which seethes with strange life.

All healing is doubly effective here. Fishing yields twice as much here, but roll a d20 for what the fishing yields.

(1) Armour-plated fish. Perfectly normal and edible.

(2) Spined toxic sea-slugs. Rather than food, each slug can be used to produce one dose of poison (d20 damage on a failed save). Best not to eat them.

(3) Huge undulating flatworms. Edible, but mildly poisonous. On a day that the flatworms are eaten, -1 to all dice rolls from stomach cramps.

(4) Twitching, squirting sea-sponges. Vaguely suggestive looking. Totally inedible.

(5) Oyster-like luminescent shellfish. As well as meat, can be harvested for pearls worth 100 gold per meal gained.

(6) Hermit crabs parasitizing living bivalves. Perfectly edible.

(7) Thumb-sized tardigrades. Edible.

(8) Incomprehensible masses of thrashing tentacles. Perfectly edible. Also produce ink from pores in their skin.

(9) Giant copepods. Edible, crunchy.

(10) Gigantic aquatic beetles. Meaty and delicious.

(11) Strange half-lobster-half-lizard creatures. Exquisite taste. Double XP on the day they’re eaten.

(12) Huge sessile tubeworms. Instead of food, half of the fishing yield is their chitinous shells, which can be used as timber.

(13) Boneless eels. Edible. Tasty.

(14) Long sea-centipedes. Have a toxic bite. Half of the fishing yield is instead poison (fall comatose on a failed save).

(15) Rubbery half-prawn-half-serpent creatures. Perfectly edible, if a little weird.

(16) Jellyfish with exoskeletons. Edible, but not very tasty.

(17) Tiny bioluminescent mouthless fish. Hallucinogenic. Roll for Omens & Portents (p XX) if eaten; everybody gets the same omen.

(18) A blob of indistinct twitching flesh. Edible, if a little bland.

(19) Exploding one-eyed ringworms. Chemically volatile. Half of the fishing yield is highly explosive, and counts as a batch of cannon ammunition.

(20) A mass of heaving, wiggling pink flesh with no discernible anatomy. Edible and delicious.

Zombie Sea

The water is dark and murky. It stinks of rot and death. Bloated things drift about, tossed by sluggish waves, gently writhing.

Merely touching the water results in sickness, death and then reanimation. Even very slight contact - a fingertip, a few droplets of spray. On contact, make a Save vs Poison. If passed, the victim is ill for an hour or so, but recovers. On a fail, note the number on the d20; after that many hours of sickness, the victim dies, and their corpse stands back up as a zombie.

Needless to say, fishing here is a terrible idea.

Each day or night spent here, there’s a 1-in-6 chance the dead floating in the water notice the ship, and 3d6 of them attack. Their stats (and those of anybody zombified) are as follows:

ò 2HD. 10 HP.

ò AC as Chain.

ò 2 Clumsy Unarmed Attacks (+0, d4 damage and save to avoid zombie sickness, as detailed above).

ò Saves as Fighter 2.

ò Vulnerable to turning, holy water and other stuff undead are vulnerable to.

ò Immune to poison, pain, cold, drowning and other stuff undead are immune to.

Jellyfish Pilgrims

Jellyfish have a simple nervous system. Not enough to be intelligent like a crab or a fish, but enough to detect changes to their surroundings, and respond to them. And, perhaps surprisingly, just sophisticated enough for faith.

Imagine the faith of small children, without sophistication, reason, or doubt. Just exuberant and sincere. This is how jellyfish worship.

This sea is, for some reason, holy to the jellyfish. They drift here, floating on imperceptible currents, and gather in huge blooms. The water is dense with them, so a ship must push them aside as it sails. From the water’s surface comes a constant, sonorous Gregorian drone, the sound of millions of jellyfish at prayer. Beneath the jellyfish’s habit-like mantles, trail several-meter long filamentous tentacles.

The water here is holy (and so can be used for things like throwing on devils, etc), but loses its potency a week after being removed from the sea. Each vial’s worth of holy water uses up one ‘slot’ for cargo in the Primrose.

Fishing here does not yield food (the jellyfish are pretty inedible) but instead the jellyfish’s toxins can be extracted from their nematocysts for use. The poison does d20 extra damage if a Save vs Poison is failed, and furthermore is effective against supernatural beings such as devils and undead that would normally be immune to poison - against unholy beings, the poison damage is doubled. Like the holy water taken from here, each dose uses up a cargo slot, and loses potency after 7 days.

Whale Cemetery

Whales come here to die. Like elephant-graveyards on land, their remains are scattered about, and a morbid air permeates the place. Every few hundred yards, another bloated whale carcass, floating as it decays.

The place is serenely haunted. Odd lights flicker over the whale-corpses at night, the sound of distant whale-song echoes from the deep. Odd little coincidences occur to travellers here - a whalebone corset might break, or images of whales rearrange themselves when nobody is looking.

If the players think to look, 1-in-6 cumulative chance each day (IE, 1-in-6 on the first day, 2-in-6 on the second) that a corpse is found that is fresh enough to have harvestable ambergris, worth 2,000 gold as treasure.

If a whale carcass is interfered with (for ambergris, or other reasons), the haunting goes from serene to wrathful. Poltergeist activity flares up on the ship, spoiling supplies and disturbing sailors. 10% of the ship’s provisions, timber, and cannon ammunition is lost to poltergeist activity, and roll for The Crew Grow Restless (p XX) for how they respond to the haunting. The haunting follows the ship once it has left the Whale Cemetery, only ending once they return and attempt to make amends to the whale whose spirit they’ve angered (a funeral, offering, service etc).

Once the haunting has begun, there is a 1-in-6 cumulative chance that the Primrose is attacked by the whale ghost seeking to exact vengeance for the desecration of its corpse. Its stats are:

ò  20 HD, 60 HP

ò AC as Unarmoured

ò Attacks with Ghostly Bite (+5, 2d20 damage, ignores non-magical defences).

ò Saves as MU 20.

ò Totally immune to non-magical physical attacks.

ò 1/2 damage from physical magical attacks (IE magic swords, fireballs etc)

ò Undead, and vulnerable to everything the undead are vulnerable to.

ò Intangible. Can attack through walls, float, swim through ships, etc.

ò As well as biting, can use Banshee Whalesong. All hearing it either take d8 damage or are permanently deafened (player chooses which)

ò Can poltergeist instead of biting, creating various spooky effects.

Nectar

The water is sweet. As if infused with dissolved sugar rather than salt. Vaguely floral scented. The taste is rather like liquid parma violets.

Drinking the nectar prevents the need for food; the dissolved sugars provide all the nutrients the body needs. Furthermore, drinking nectar allows the drinker to perceive people’s souls as luminous auras that hang around their bodies. By gauging the appearance of this aura, the viewer can judge the state of the subject’s soul; any damage to it, how tainted it is by sin, any pacts that have a claim on it, and so forth. This ability to view souls lasts the rest of the day after nectar is drunk.

Each day that nectar is drunk, there is a 1-in-6 chance that the body becomes physiologically reliant on it; if this happens, the drinker can only gain nourishment from drinking nectar; their body fails to process other food, in the same way that a carnivorous animal cannot digest leaves.

A day’s worth of Nectar uses a cargo slot, and loses its potency after one week.

   

Engines of Heaven

The island itself is a steep blade of stone jutting from the ocean, jagged cliffs down either side of a sharp crest. The island’s flanks are covered in gorse and heather, storm-lashed and exposed.

At the summit, a huge machine. Multiple intersecting rings and disks, some fifty feet across or more, built from brass and lead. Like a humongous astrolabe or gyroscope. All mounted on a central axle that impales the stone beneath. In the centre of the mass, a metal brazier, with traces of ashes within it. At the base of the central axle, the interface; a row of seven four-foot levers, each with three positions (low, medium and high).

Operating The Engine

The engine controls the base values of reality - the moral and metaphysical equivalents of the fundamental physical constants - in the local area (IE, in the entire Islands At The Edge Of The World. Each such value is controlled by one of the levers. From left to right, the levers are:

ò Permittivity of Free Will

ò Human Potential

ò Intensity of Suffering

ò Capacity for Growth

ò Speed of Life

ò Depravity of Original Sin

ò Degree of Animism

To make the engine work, a fire must be lit in the brazier. To achieve this, somebody needs to climb up and fill the brazier with fuel - peat, coal or wood all work fine. When the fire is lit, the wheels and rings begin to turn around and within one another, rotating at varying rates and angles.

Needless to say, being caught among the rings as they start turning is not a particularly good situation to be in. 3d6 damage is dealt each round to anybody being ground between the rotating parts of the engine. To avoid this, once the brazier is filled with fuel, it is wisest to climb back down and light it from a distance, perhaps by shooting a flaming arrow.

Once the engine is working, pulling a lever to a new setting causes the machine to alter its motion, which in turn results in an alteration to the base values of reality. The disks and wheels flip into new angles relative to one another, and continue their rotation. The alteration to reality is reflected by an alteration to certain basic game mechanics. These continue once the fire has burned out (and the engine powered down) and affect the game for as long as the party remains in the Islands At The End Of The World.

If the engine can somehow be removed from the island, and transported back to the mortal world, it can be set up elsewhere, and has the exact same effects on its surroundings; a single engine covers an area roughly the size of a moderate mortal nation, such as France or Poland.

Permittivity Of Free Will

This value decides how much control mortals have over their lives, and how much is pre-ordained by predictable brain chemistry, societal influence, and the forces of destiny. It begins at Medium.

If changed to Low, humans become far less independent. They tend towards obedience and conformity, and follow the pre-determined paths fate has laid out for them.. Mind-affecting magic is more effective; it’s duration is doubled and no saves are allowed.

If changed to High, humans become almost impossible to control, wilful and independent. Fate becomes easily discarded, and prophecies easily subverted. Furthermore, mind-affecting magic always allows a save to resist it, and its duration is halved, with an absolute a maximum of one year.

Human Potential

Human potential measures the degree to which mortals are capable of achieving greatness. Which setting it begins in varies by campaign, but in most OSR systems probably begins at ‘Low’.

Human Potential alters how character stats are generated. When it is altered, new PCs roll their stats using the new method, and existing PCs get the option to re-roll their stats exactly once per setting (IE only getting a single new stat array per setting).

At Low Human Potential, humans are basically bland, and exceptional individuals are rare, much like in the real world. At character gen, all attributes are generated on 3d6.

At Medium Human Potential, humans have a capacity for heroic greatness, comparable to a prelapsarian time of legend. Roll all stats on 4d6, and take the best 3.

At High Human Potential, humans are frequently exceptional and widely varied. Roll all stats on 3d20, taking the best single result.

Intensity of Suffering

This value determines how serious pain and injury are, and generally how unpleasant life is. Altering it alters the ‘tone’ of your narration; at ‘low’ gloss over mundane unpleasantness. At ‘medium’, proceed as normal, and at ‘high’ go full grimdark.

Furthermore, the lethality of injury varies depending on Intensity of Suffering. Halve all damage taken by everybody (PCs, NPCs and monsters alike) at ‘Low’, and double it at High.

Capacity For Growth

This value regulates how quickly mortals learn and experience character development. It begins at Medium. At low, human nature is basically set in stone, and people rarely change. XP gained is halved, and the player may choose to flat reject any mechanic or effect that would alter their PC’s mindset, goals or inner nature.

At High, humans learn rapidly and their natures change easily in response to events. All XP gained is doubled. PCs will find that the motivations, loyalties, goals etc of those they deal with regularly will frequently alter in unpredictable ways.

Speed of Life

This value sets the expected length and speed of a human lifespan; adjusting it likewise adjusts the lifespans of other species proportionally. At its default setting (Medium) a normal human lifespan is about seventy years.

At ‘high’, humans live fast and burn out young. A human reaches maturity at around seven, and old age in only twenty years. They must eat, sleep etc four times a day, and likewise natural healing happens four times as often; at dawn, midday, dusk, and midnight.

Conversely, at ‘low’, humans age slowly, potentially reaching three hundred years old or more. They must eat only once every four days, and sleep one day in every four. Healing is likewise slowed; they only naturally heal when they sleep, every fourth day.

Depravity of Original Sin

This value determines the initial, inherent moral standing of mortals. Where it is set will depend on the tone of your campaign. At High, humans are fundamentally wicked, and redemption is hard to achieve. At Medium, humans are neither born wicked nor innocent, but rather accrue virtue and vice over the course of their life as a result of their actions. At Low, humans are born innocent, hard to corrupt, and forgiveness is easily gained.

Unlike other settings, this one has no mechanical effects, but will instead alter the tone and feel of the game and may have serious moral implications.

Degree of Animism

This value sets the limits for what entities are capable of human-like thought, and as such for being held morally culpable for their actions. By default, it is set to Low, and only people can be sentient and capable of sin.

At Medium, animals think like people, can talk, and can be held morally culpable.

At High, even important inanimate objects have awareness and are capable of sin; their capacity to act might be limited, however.

Harpies

Creatures combining the heads and breasts of women with the bodies, wings and talons of  vultures. While their claws are dextrous enough to use tools, such things are difficult for them, and they prefer to have others do their work for them.

A harpy is gifted with a preternatural ability to sense the sins and crimes of others, and take a certain cruel delight in using this knowledge to their advantage. Harpies claim to have been created with the purpose of capturing sinners and delivering them to hell. They view their acts as perfectly justified; if their victims didn’t want to suffer so, they should never have sinned in the first place.

Encounters with harpies will vary wildly depending on the moral character of the PCs. The virtuous find the vulture-women pleasant and helpful company, while more weak-willed sinful characters will be tormented and perhaps enslaved, serving as the harpies’ thralls. The greatest sinners are attacked without mercy and with great cunning, so that the harpies might drag their souls off to the pit.

Their Settlements

Harpy settlements are crude affairs, often little more than nests made from sticks and mud. These nests might be made under tree canopies or overhanging cliffs, or else on a commanding position on the harpies’ island.

As well as the harpies’ own nests, there are the homes of their thralls - human sinners whom the harpies control by invoking their sins. These homes tend to be rather better quality than those of their mistresses, simple but fairly comfortable stone or wood huts.

Lastly, at the heart of every harpy colony is a deep crack, from which sulphurous vapours issue. It is into this pit that the harpies cast the souls of sinners. At the bottom of the pit is hell itself; if a PC decides to go down, they probably won’t be coming back.

Stats

• 3 Hit-dice.
• 10 HP.
• Armour as Chain.
• 2 Claws (+3, d4) and either a command or a shriek.
• Saves as Fighter 3.
• Can fly.
• By concentrating a little, can learn the greatest sin of somebody they observe; ask the player OOC what it is.
• By naming a victim’s greatest sin, can lay a command upon that victim. Victim has a choice: comply, or resist. Resisting the command deals damage, depending on the sinfulness of the victim; d4 for the mostly innocent, d8 for the moderately sinful, d12 for the truly depraved. No save.
• A victim killed by a harpy has its soul torn from its body. If the victim was virtuous, the soul dissipates to meet its reward in paradise, but if sinful, the harpy’s claws dig into its intangible form, and can carry it away to the torment that awaits it. Either way, resurrection is prevented.
• Shrieking at full volume damages the ears and psyches of those able to hear it. Everybody hearing the shriek takes d8 damage. 

Harpy thralls have the stats of Lost Sailors, and don’t live particularly pleasant lives.

Wormwood Fountains

An island, a rough stone pillar jutting from the ocean. Cliffs and a flat top. Stunted plants and nesting gulls.

At the top, there is a crater, a pit smashed into the stone by some ancient high-energy impact. From the crater, a stream of green-tinted water trickles, cascading over the rock into the sea. Where the water passes, no plants grow. The sea around here is anoxic, dead, bitter to the tongue. Without even the minutest of planktonic life. But thrumming with potential.

From this water, bitter fumes ooze greasily into the air. Your head swims as if intoxicated, you see images imposed onto the back of your skull, like memories you never experienced. There is poisoned knowledge here.

Wormwood

These things are all true at once.

Wormwood was a star, burning with sickly green-white nuclear balefire. Coming loose from the firmament, it fell disastrously to earth.

Wormwood was a missile, the bitter judgement of the divine, hurled against an earth that had displeased it.

Wormwood was once an angel, that turned from the divine light and was cast down, plummeting to the world of mortals.

Where Wormwood fell, the earth buckled under the impact. The waters were poisoned, living things grew sickly yet were filled with cruel cunning and dark wisdom.

The site of Wormwood’s impact has become a crack in the earth, from which the water of bitter knowledge flows.

Womwood is aware. It has a slow, cold mind that creeps into everything its water touches. It knows secrets. It wants to share its knowledge with the unwilling.

Drinking The Bitter Water

If a PC touches Wormwood-tainted water, their vision blurs, they feel the pressure of alien knowledge trying to worm its way into their skull. Explain the effects (mechanical and in-fiction) of drinking the water to them.

When the water is drunk, knowledge crams into the drinker’s mind. Dozens of unconnected images, then hundreds, then thousands, then more. More than one mind can safely contain. Five things happen all at once:

• The drinker suffers d12 damage, bleeds from the eyes, ruptures capiliaries in their nose.
• From this point on, their blood has green flecks in it, and can be drunk like Wormwood. From this point on, Wormwood perceives and remembers everything the drinker perceives and remembers.
• The drinker can try to make sense of the images and memories forced into their skull. They can ask the GM any question they want: the GM will give a completely truthful answer, but presented in the most harmful way possible. In whatever way the knowledge sought might lead to fear, hate, despair, spite, the GM should put that spin on it. Doing this deals another d12 damage. The drinker can do this as many times as they wish.
• The drinker can permanently sacrifice any amount of both Wisdom and Charisma, and gain that much Intelligence.

Intoxication dulls the impact of Wormwood, as the horrible knowledge struggles to find purchase in a mind lubricated with alcohol. If the drinker is already drunk, the damage is reduced to d4.

Projection Agencies in Esoteric Enterprises

Visitors from somewhere. Official seeming. Well equipped, well organised, brandish ID for agencies that don’t exist,  and never existed. Speak in professional jargon.

Agents of the projection agencies are unfamiliar with many of the little details of the real world. They recall alternate histories, and see things not as they are but as they might have been. They catalogue everything they encounter, are relentlessly curious about every mundane facet of everyday life.

They know of the Men In Black, and treat them with a degree of scorn. Some say the Men In Black and the projection agencies are engaged in a cold war of infiltration and counter-infiltration. Certainly, the Men In Black seem to hate them with a degree of venom that is far more personal than they display against most occult criminals.

The existence of Projection Agents is unstable. If seriously injured, subject to great stress of exertion, or exposed to anti-magic, they simply dissolve into static and vanish. This instability is not entirely a detriment, however. They engage with reality as if one step removed, able as if reality were a game and they have cheat-codes. Infinite ammunition, no-clip mode, bullet-time, fast-travel.

When they dissolve into static, they aren’t destroyed, merely sent back where they came from. Sometimes, they return, seemingly no worse for it.

They hate and fear paradox, and the untamed magic that creates it. Regardless of their other alliances and rivalries, they seem willing to work with anybody to exterminate paradox beasts.

They talk in vague terms about the ‘seven hundred and seventy steps of reality’ and the grand conflict between law and chaos. They frequently enlist local talent as pawns and proxies in this grand conflict.

They do not exist. They never existed. None of the preceding text is true, do not trouble yourself with it.

Projection Agent: 1 flesh (1 dice), 13 grit (4 dice). AC 15(bullet-proof vest and high dexterity). Charm 4/6, Stealth 4/6, Perception 4/6. Saves 10+. Handgun (+5, d8), All stats 13.

Cannot be healed by any means except other projection agents. Engaging in any sort of stressful or strenuous activity deals 1 damage to them. Upon taking damage to flesh (or other serious harm), dissolves into static and vanishes.

Possess various supernatural abilities, varying by department and agency. Using any of these powers is a stressful activity for the agent, and as such does one damage to them.

· All security agents can intercept attacks that would hit their allies, taking the damage in their place, and when an attack drops an enemy get to make another attack for free.

· All logistics agents can cause objects to appear from nowhere, or gain information that should be impossible for them to know.

· All tech support agents can heal all damage done to a fellow agent, or remove a curse, poison or similar effect, if given a turn to work safely.

Surveillance agents get abilities depending on their agency.

· Morphean Agents can become completely invisible merely by remaining still, walk through physical barriers, and see invisible things.

· Orphic agents can reanimate dead things as husks, view and understand the death of any corpse they touch, and age a victim they touch by 3d20 years.

· Theresan agents can ward off unnatural things by brandishing a holy icon, tell if something is unnatural instinctively, and heal the injuries of normal mortals with a touch (curing d6 flesh damage or a serious wound).

· Liddel agents can grow or shrink at will, blink out of existance and return a set amount of time later as if no time had passed for them, and render a victim they touch 2d20 years younger.

· Hypnos agents can pause time for a single round for a victim they touch, create a holographic image of anything they want, or listen to and understand radio signals.